Tang Wan’er had something else on her mind. She was worried that Zhuang had been avoiding them because Niu Yueqing had learned about her visits to Zhuang’s hotel room. She recalled that when she had stealthily appeared outside his room that afternoon, the door was ajar but Zhuang was nowhere in sight. After waiting half an hour, she had to leave, so she walked up and down the hallway before going downstairs and sneaking into the alley, where she checked to see if the light was on in the third window. She waited two hours, until her neck was sore and her feet hurt, but the window remained dark; finally she turned and went home in dejection. They had agreed on her visit, so why wasn’t he in his room? Somehow their tryst must have been exposed, or Niu Yueqing had gone to the hotel and forced him to return home every night. Either that or the hotel staff was gossiping when they cleaned Zhuang’s room and found long hairs and curly pubic hairs on his sheets and in the tub. With her mind occupied with these thoughts, she was so lethargic she stayed home several days in a row, wedging herself into the bed or a chair as she read a book called A Collection of Great Classical Essays. Included in the book was “Six Chapters of a Drifting Life” by Shen Fu, and “Reminiscences of the Plum Shadow Studio” by Mao Pijiang, about his life with the famed courtesan Dong Xiaowan, along with a section on women in “Idle Sentiments and Occasional Thoughts” by Li Yu, with which she began. She was puzzled by the section about the critical trait of deportment until she read the argument that fine deportment can enhance the allure of an unattractive woman, while poor deportment can detract from the charm of a pretty one. Deportment for a woman is like a flame to fire, like brightness to a lamp, or luster to jewelry. It was an eye-opening revelation. Isn’t deportment what we call style? she said to herself, confident that she definitely had that. She then fell head over heels for Dong Xiaowan in “Plum Shadow Studio,” and compared the talented Mao Pijiang with Zhuang Zhidie. Mao was the romantic sort; so was Zhuang. Did that mean she was a modern-day Dong Xiaowan? Could anything be more wonderfully coincidental, since there was also “wan” in her name? She cocked her head and, sensing that Dong Xiaowan was drifting gracefully toward her, smiled sweetly. Then she gazed out the window at the pear tree, thinking how beautiful it was in the spring when it was covered in simple white blossoms, and in the winter when it was blanketed by thick snow. She would be inside listening to the snow while Zhuang walked down the snowy path to wait for her; he must look as white as the tree. Being summertime, there were no blossoms nor any snow, and the leaf-covered tree looked emaciated, as sparse as her life. Engrossed in her dreamy state, she read on. When she read about rain, she got up and walked into the yard, where she found, to her surprise, that rain was falling. Gazing at the pear tree in the lonely rain, she was convinced that it was Zhuang Zhidie’s avatar. So had he come here to wait for her long before she’d moved into this place? She wrapped her arms tightly around the tree for a while before going back inside, where she let a raindrop fall from her eye onto the open book.
The day dragged on until night. It was late, and Zhou Min was still not home. The sound of a bell from the nearby nunnery made the night seem colder than usual. A gust of wind whistled through the paper covering a broken windowpane, making her heart race as she imagined Zhuang pacing outside. She raced out in her slippers, her hairpin falling out as she flew down the stone steps, which sent her hair cascading down over her shoulders. She tried to pick up the pin, but gave up after several unsuccessful attempts. She went to open the gate — not even a shadow was out there. Looking left and right, she wondered if he might be waving to her from a dark corner; eventually, as if in a daze, she made her way back inside, realizing that it was just the wind playing tricks on her. When she finally collected herself, she accepted the fact that Zhuang Zhidie had not come and, after being absent for many days, might never return. She choked up, and with tears on her cheeks, she sighed over her sad fate. Once she started sobbing, she couldn’t stop, and soon she was howling, as a pent-up longing for her son sought release. A quick calculation told her that he would be three years old in three days, which prompted her to open the door and go out again, unconcerned about whether or not Zhou would be back. She flagged down a pedicab driver, offering him three yuan to take her to the post office near the clock tower so she could send a telegram to Tongguan. After sending her son a message reading “Happy birthday to my boy,” she sobbed all the way home and went to bed.
Upon his return late that night, Zhou was greeted by a dark house with no dinner prepared for him. He turned on the light and pulled back the blanket to ask her what was wrong. Puzzled by her eyes, as puffy as rotten peaches, he saw the receipt for a telegram to Tongguan by her pillow. He demanded an explanation, so enraged that he slapped her. Leaping off the bed naked, she grabbed his hair and spat out angrily, “How dare you hit me! That motherless child is about to turn three years old, and even the worst mother should be able to send him a five-word telegram!”
“Do you have water for brains? Or is that a pig’s brain in your head?” he demanded. “What good is a telegram? When he gets it, he will check to see where it came from and will know it’s Xijing. Were you planning for him to know where we are?”
“So what if he knows?” she said. “Xijing is as big as the ocean; how is he going to find us?” She looked at her face in the mirror, and seeing the red marks from his hand, she reached up and pulled hair out of his head.
“You’re fearless, aren’t you?” she sobbed. “Why are you afraid he might find you? You’re scared of him. A gutless coward like you should never have seduced his wife into running away with him and sneaking into Xijing like thieves. I don’t mind roaming like this, but how dare you hit me? He never touched a hair on my head, but you, you’re a heartless brute. Why not hit me again, why not kill me?”
Seeing her swollen face reminded Zhou of how hard it had been on her, wandering around with him. Filled with regret for his cruelty, he got down on his knees and wrapped his arms around her legs to beg for forgiveness, while using her hand to slap his own face. An expert in sweet-talking women, he managed to stop her crying by showing that he hated himself for his actions. As she wiped away her tears, he went up, put his arms around her, and kissed her, then tickled her to make her laugh as proof that she forgave him. She was so ticklish, he had once joked that it was a sign she’d had many admirers. Zhuang Zhidie had also tickled her, digging in the more she laughed. She could not stop laughing, which put his mind at ease as he went to the kitchen to make dinner. He brought some food for her before they went to bed in peace and harmony.
Over the days he was shut in at home, Zhuang sensed an invisible shadow looming over him. He felt like complaining, but could find no excuse; unable to leave the house for any sort of diversion and enjoying no visits from old friends, he could only pass the days reading. But he forgot what he read almost immediately. All he had for amusement were chats with Liu Yue. By then they were closer than just a domestic helper and her employer. He asked her to sing, so she sang a folk tune called “Holding Hands.”